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[was]

Was,
What were the problems that occurred, if you don't mind my asking? Would it make a difference if you could spend, say, time instead of XP?
RC

-There were a large number of problems. We played under a combination method of XP and money spent on training to level up. First, no one liked having to spend their hard earned XP and money on training. The ever increasing cost was infuriating. This problem was exacerbated by the fact that the DM didn't figure these expenditures into XP and monetary awards. Much of the time we were close to leveling up, but short of the money to do so.

-Second, the time and effort spent on finding someone to train you, who happens to have the right level, ate up a lot of in-game time. In a group that doesn't have a lot of time to game, that turns out to be a major annoyance. Additionally, trying to actually locate someone with the proper requirements to train you, unless you regularly return to a well-known base of operations, turned out to be nearly impossible in unfamiliar locals. On top of that, if you were in small towns and villages you couldn't locate any trainers. Unless we were in a very large city, we didn't get to level up.

-Third, the time and expenditures spent on training were useless if the instructor failed his rolls. This happened several times, leaving upset players with much less XP and money with zero gain to show for it.

-Finally, the practice conflicted with the notion of gaining your experience through adventuring. In other words, adventuring functions as a type of on-the-job training. It just seems that characters gain more experience in the field thwarting foes than they can in a training session.

-In the end, all the players got tired of it and quit when the DM refused to alter his advancement methods. It was a very, very, very ugly gaming experience. Be extremely careful if you choose to use it. This method is one of the very few house rules that I refuse to play under and will never consider using when running my campaigns.

-sorry if this sounds like a rant, it's a touchy subject to me-

 

[Raven Crowking]

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[ElectricDragon]

This probably makes no difference to you, but I will mention it anyway. The Profession skill is a Trained skill, meaning you can not try it without at least a rank in it.

Other than that, I have tried this before (in earlier editions of the game) with mixed results. I like your seasonal option though and think I will give it a try. Training only costs time. The only problem I can forsee is the adventure where the party gains enough XP to level up (and need this level to defeat the challenges I have awaiting them), but taking the time to train would allow the BBEG to fulfil his objective without obstruction. I guess I could structure it so that the BBEG has to train for a new level at the same time thus granting the training time needed, but that seems a cop-out. Any ideas?

Ciao
Dave

 

[Nim]

One of the things that I am rather concerned about IMC is the "skyrocket effect" inherent in 3.X. The way the rules are written, within the course of 3-5 game years, the average character should be able to move from 1st to 20th level. At that rate of progression, even relatively slow NPCs who take thrice as long to level up should be pushing the epic boundaries after 15 years. If we assume an average starting age of 20 for a human NPC, then by the time that person is 35, they should be 20th level (if they have a PC class)....say, 45 if they are really not on the ball.

Well, let's see. Each level is 13.5 encounters. Getting to 20th level, you advance 19 times, so that's 256.5 equal-CL encounters. Over 5 game years, that's almost exactly 1 encounter per week. An equal-CL encounter involves real risk (even a roleplaying encounter involves some sort of risk, perhaps social rather than physical...no risk, no encounter!). And pretty soon, finding encounters of an appropriate level becomes tough.

For NPCs, I think the level-curve in the population is mostly a result of the fact that once you get to about 5th level or so, you're just not running INTO many things in day to day life that challenge you enough to merit XP...unless you're a hero in unusual circumstances. If you live in an area where the biggest local challenges are CR 4, then unless you decide to go elsewhere, you're NEVER going to hit 10th level.

Training rules are all well and good, but if what you're concerned about is an implausible rate of advancement, I think that you need to attack the real problem: the pace of the campaign and how quickly the PCs get XP. Heroes who are caught up in an epic quest might well advance as quickly as you described, and that's appropriate to the genre. If you're running a different style of game, maybe you need to insert some downtime on your own. Life isn't always one adventure after another, after all. Run a few adventures, and then let the PCs lives be boring for a year or two before the next big quest comes around.

 

[Raven Crowking]

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[Nim]

Yet, if you'd like anything approaching a believable passage of time (as I would) within the game world, you have to either (1) tell the PCs that they cannot continue adventuring nonstop or (2) provide them with motive to choose to not adventure nonstop. And, no, I do not mean that you have to play out every dreary dinner party, or every round of time that passes while they winter in Rookhaven. What I mean is tha the players need to have solid motives to allow the PCs to have fuller lives.

Training might not be it. In fact, the major objection to training seems to be that it takes a portion of the pacing/reward structure out of the players' hands. However, the idea of master/apprentice relationships, fighting schools, and mentors who are surpassed by their students all appeal to me. I think that these are valid fantasy archetypes, and that the concept of training speaks to them. I do think that it Was pointed out fairly well that the players should have several options for dealing with the training question, however, each of them with different strengths and liabilities.

I think these are excellent points. What I was getting at wasn't so much that training rules are bad (and the ones you have here might work just fine), but that it's a more pervasive problem than JUST training, and that training rules alone won't solve it.

Hmm.

Players are always going to want to adventure; it's the heart of the game, after all, and it's fun. So a lot of the pacing comes down to character motivations. If the characters have goals that can be pursued through 'downtime', it'll be a lot easier to slow the pace of the game somewhat (while skipping past a lot of that time, so as not to bore the players). So to an extent, the questions are 'what are the characters after' and 'how can we make downtime part of accomplishing that?'

 

[Gansk]

I also have training IMC to try to deal with the 'skyrocket' issue. I managed to get the PC's to use up two game years before they got to 10th level. It's not perfect, but it's better than three months.

I basically took the optional training rules suggested in the DMG and tweaked them a bit. Basic training to gain a level in class abilities is 1 day per level. Training for feats is two weeks, training for 1 rank in a trained skill is one week. Players can train for two 'subjects' at the same time. Training cost is 50 gp per week. Self-training is allowed, but the training time is doubled.

My observations: The players will seek to optimize whatever system you put in place. In my system, the cheapest and shortest way to train is to find a trainer, so the PC's travel from the countryside back to the city because it saves time and money in the long run. They self-train only when they have no other choice. This gives the BBEG plenty of time between each dungeon foray, which slows down the PC's progress because they have to kill reinforcements hired to guard BBEG headquarters.

I would definitely not introduce die rolls into a training system, as PC's would pay a penalty for something out of their control. I see the need to have a 'level up immediately' option, but I don't think XP is the answer. XP represents both game time and real time, and no one wants to waste real time earning 50% extra XP to gain the same level as everybody else. They would rather just give the BBEG the extra time to prepare.

 

[genshou]

Again, the problem is not in how long it takes to gain a level in real life, but in the game. Your system of unstructured time jumps is a good one, but I find myself faced with players who expect their PCs to be "in game" 24/7. In a not-too distant game, when I moved forward approximately three months, the immediate response was not "And what is happening now?" but rather "Why couldn't we be doing something during those times?"

By "something", I do not mean training or craft checks or making magic items. I mean looting some old temple somewhere.

Characters should exist to do more than loot temples. If they have nothing else they want to do in their entire lives, then perhaps you need to introduce role-playing elements to help your players create three-dimensional PCs.

I'm in the opposite camp of most here. When I play, I WANT to have downtime. I WANT to train. Otherwise, my PC doesn't have time to develop a personality or role-play relationships with others (PCs and NPCs, friendships, dalliances, long-term romance, and even emnity and rivalry).

If you were your character, would you go straight from one harrowing, life-threatening ordeal to the next? Sure, you wouldn't take a year off between adventures, but sometimes you would just want to relax and enjoy life.

If your character never takes time off from adventuring, they are just like a person in the real world who focuses so much on their job that they lose everything else. They've become a one-dimensional monster slayer, not a character.

 

[was]

Nothing to apologize for. I asked for the specifics!
Honestly, you've given me something to think about.
Training was a part of the D&D game going back to 1st Edition AD&D, and I admit that it is one which has had mixed results. The fact that, as you get higher level, finding a trainer becomes much harder is a point well taken. It was, in fact, part of my thinking that as the PCs grew in power, they would have others seek them out for training, and thus gain a network of people who either pay them, or owe them favors. Or both.
Again, I have to ask, what if you simply had to expend a set amount of time (without a trainer)? For example, one of the things that I am doing is the "seasonal turn" unit of game time (as mentioned above). What if training was a seasonal turn option?
The use of training or using XP for training might be more palatable if worded otherwise. I.e., "If you are X % of XP from levelling, you may train to gain those XP as a bonus." The net effect is the same, imho, assuming that the DM takes the system into account, but it might feel different to the players.

-I know that training is an 'old school' thing and I have indeed played in a couple of 1st ed. campaigns. I am just not comfortable with systems that require it for levelling purposes. The idea that a party can go out and defeat a dragon, for example, but can't level until they spend some time in training afterwards just doesn't make much sense to me.

-I don't think that the training that you're proposing is unreasonable when done in such a way that it does not consume vast quantities of in-game time. It could work when done between sessions, as a turn-based 'seasonal' option or during short periods of 'downtime'. If I might suggest another option, I have run 'training' of sorts in my campaigns, but not as a method of levelling. Usually it is an in-game scenario/method for a character to join a desired organization or to gain a desired prestige class.

-On a side note, I agree with other posters when stating that, yes, there should be some 'downtime' for pcs. They should not be rushing from one life-threatening ordeal to another. However, downtime can be spent in various ways. Visiting relatives, researching clues, investigating rumors, building businesses and working a trade are all viable, depth-building character options. I just don't think that spending all of a pc's 'downtime' training is a good idea.

 

[genshou]

-On a side note, I agree with other posters when stating that, yes, there should be some 'downtime' for pcs. They should not be rushing from one life-threatening ordeal to another. However, downtime can be spent in various ways. Visiting relatives, researching clues, investigating rumors, building businesses and working a trade are all viable, depth-building character options. I just don't think that spending all of a pc's 'downtime' training is a good idea.

Right, because that causes the same problem that never taking any downtime in the first place does. Characters should spend time doing something utterly non-heroic, such as wooing a village girl, "chillin' at da crib", or becoming the greatest loiterer ever to not walk the face of the world. All perfectly acceptable choices for a person to make; we all need time to just relax and have pressure-free fun now and then.